At present, conventional lighting applications such as light bulbs are being replaced by LED-based lighting applications. As such, LED lamps are known that are provided with a conventional screw fitting (e.g. an E27 fitting) and a base part in or near the screw fitting to house the electronics for driving the LED lamp. Such LED lamps are e.g. known from U.S. Pat. No. 6,227,679. U.S. Pat. No. 6,227,679 e.g. discloses an LED lamp having a base provided with a plurality of LEDs (as e.g. illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 6,227,679) having different orientations as a single LED does not, in general, provide an illumination pattern substantially covering 360°. Typically, the base part of such an LED lamp can be comparatively large, and may thus prohibit light to be radiated in directions substantially towards and beyond the fitting. Therefore, replacing a conventional filament based light bulb of an existing light fixture by a known LED lamp may result in a changed, undesired illumination pattern. Phrased differently, a substantially omni-directional illumination pattern (as e.g. obtained from a filament light bulb) may be difficult to realise with known LED lamps; as such, known LED lamps are not suited to replace incandescent light bulbs in all current applications.
Furthermore, known LED-based lamps may have a substantially different appearance compared to filament based lamps. Therefore, in applications where the typical appearance of e.g. a filament based light bulb is desired or wanted, e.g. an application where the user has a direct view on the incandescent light bulb, a replacement of the existing light bulb by a known LED lamp may have a low acceptance by the user.
In view of the above drawbacks of known LED lamps, it is an object of the present invention to provide an LED lamp that is better suited to provide illumination conditions comparable to conventional light bulbs.